Community Colleges

News about Community Colleges, including commentary and archival articles published in The New York Times.

Chronology of Coverage

Mar. 12, 2015

LaGuardia Community College announces that Goldman Sachs will give school $2 million, which will almost double its small endowment; Goldman chief executive Lloyd C Blankfein says gift will help bolster valuable role community colleges serve in society, and that company has set aside additional $1 million to help community colleges across country. MORE

Mar. 11, 2015

Community colleges in Texas and the Gulf Coast region are servicing surge in demand for welders, pipe fitters and other types of skilled labor that had once seemed doomed to obsolescence; insistent hunger for welders in particular has led to unusually close partnership between booming energy industry and local vocational schools (Series: A Shifting Middle). MORE

Feb. 27, 2015

Editorial asserts City University of New York's Accelerated Study in Associate Programs, which provide academic and financial support to community college students, may serve as national model for improving graduation rates; notes research showing program significantly improves both community college graduation rates and rates of subsequent enrollment in four-year colleges. MORE

Feb. 18, 2015

Eduardo Porter Economic Scene column holds that while Pres Obama's ambitious plan to offer free tuition could one day leverage incredible potential of community colleges, it faces enormous stumbling block in form of low graduation rates; argues that plan might require additional resources if it is to become engine of upward mobility that Obama wants it to be. MORE

Feb. 7, 2015

Republican lawmakers question motives behind Pres Obama's plan for free community college; complain that they were never consulted on developing a proposal. MORE

Jan. 21, 2015

Frank Bruni Op-Ed column warns that efforts to improve access to higher education, like Pres Obama's proposal for free community colleges, could supplant initiatives for better primary and secondary education; points to report by nonprofit America Achieves that reinforces idea that education at all levels must be continuous investment. MORE

Jan. 20, 2015

David Brooks Op-Ed column criticizes Pres Obama's plan to make community college free for many students, arguing that it focuses on enrollment at expense of graduation rates; observes some 66 to 80 percent of community college students drop out, and that Obama's plan will do little to address issue; offers alternative proposals, like paying for living expenses, textbooks and remedial courses. MORE

Jan. 15, 2015

Editorial supports Pres Obama's proposal to make community colleges tuition-free, but says states and local governments need to start keeping them to loftier standards and commit to steady financing; points out program would aid as many as nine million students. MORE

Jan. 14, 2015

Op-Ed article by actor Tom Hanks describes how attending community college was invaluable experience that helped him grow as a young man; expresses hope that Pres Obama's plan to make two years of community college free will gain support, as it will undoubtedly change many people's lives for the better. MORE

Jan. 10, 2015

Pres Obama urges Congress to adopt plan that will make community college tuition-free nationwide; critics warn that some public 4-year colleges could see steep drops in enrollment. MORE

Jan. 9, 2015

Pres Obama says he will introduce plan to make community colleges tuition-free for millions of students, in attempt to respond to rising income inequality; program would be paid for by federal government and participating states, but will probably not be welcomed by Republican Congress; Obama plans to make initiative part of his budget proposal. MORE

Dec. 21, 2014

Community college instructors struggle to engage students who have often been failed by education system, and who hold dim view of their own prospects and value of knowledge; less than 17 percent of full-time students graduate within three years at LaGuardia Community College, reflecting nationwide problem; question of how to better serve such students is essential to larger issues of economic mobility (Series: Degrees and Difficulties). MORE

Oct. 5, 2014

Students at LaGuardia Community College, ethnically diverse school located in immigrant hub of western Queens, face number of challenges to earning degree, including low-income backgrounds, outside obligations and lack of support at school; only one-quarter of LaGuardia students receive associate degree within six years (Series: Degrees and Difficulty). MORE

Apr. 14, 2014

Editorial warns quality of education at community colleges is suffering, given that part-time faculty members far outnumber full-time members on most community college campuses; notes part-timers, often abysmally paid, generally have little time to prepare lessons and are rarely given any guidance; urges community colleges to do a better job of screening the part-time instructors they hire. MORE

Feb. 27, 2014

Feb. 20, 2014

Seven former employees file federal fraud lawsuit against Harris School of Business and its parent company Premier Education Group, which owns more than two dozen trade schools and community colleges across nation; suit contends that schools, which charge over $10,000 for one-year programs, routinely misled students about career prospects and falsified records to enroll them, in order to maintain inflow of government grant and loan dollars. MORE

Feb. 5, 2014

Tennessee Gov Bill Haslam's proposal to make two years of community college and technical school free for all students would make state the only one in country to charge no tuition or fees to incoming students; Haslam is one of several Republican governors promoting increased spending toward better-educated workforce. MORE

Dec. 13, 2013

Coalition of colleges from across country will announce novel alliance aimed at producing high-achieving community college graduates and making it easier for them to transfer into bachelor’s programs. MORE

May. 23, 2013

Century Foundation report shows that community colleges have received declining share of government spending on higher education over decade even as their student bodies have become poorer and more heavily African-American and Latino; data reflects widening gulf between four-year colleges that serve primarily affluent students and community colleges that serve low-income students. MORE

Apr. 30, 2013

Manhattan's New Community College will be renamed for Stella and Charles Guttman, whose foundation is giving the school $15 million, one of the largest donations ever for a public two-year college. MORE

Feb. 10, 2013

Hundreds of school districts and community colleges across California have used capital appreciation bonds since 2007 to raise nearly $7 billion for construction projects; bonds allow schools to delay payment for years, or even decades, making future taxpayers liable for huge interest payments that can balloon to more than 10 times amount borrowed. MORE

Jan. 25, 2013

Court documents say shooting at Houston-area Lone Star College that wounded three people erupted when two men argued after bumping into each other; suspect Carlton Berry has been arrested on aggravated assault and second suspect has been charged but not arrested. MORE

Jan. 24, 2013

Police say they have not recovered pistol used in shooting at Lone Star College near Houston, Tex, that left four people hospitalized, but have charged Carlton Neal Berry Jr, student they say fired shots; search is underway for possible second suspect. MORE

Jul. 20, 2012

City University of New York is set to open a two-year college with newly designed structure and curriculum that it hopes will greatly improve students' chances of earning an associate degree and transferring to a four-year college; school is multimillion-dollar experiment in how to fix what ails community colleges. MORE

Jul. 3, 2012

Joe Nocera Op-Ed column highlights the work of advocacy group Year Up, which concentrates on helping poor high school graduates to land good jobs; contends that the program seeks to address the fact that high school diplomas are often not enough in today's economy; asserts that community colleges play a similar role, but they need more resources from states. MORE

May. 25, 2012

Floyd Norris High & Low Finance column observes that while state and local governments spend less on higher eduction, the volume of federally guaranteed loans to students at so-called proprietary colleges, which intend to operate at a profit, continues to grow; points out community colleges, the ones most likely to offer alternatives to the students recruited by the far more expensive proprietary schools, are suffering some of the largest reductions. MORE

Apr. 16, 2012

Michael Winerip On Education column notes that a growing number of community college students with top-level grades are making the jump to more selective institutions to obtain full degrees. MORE

Apr. 6, 2012

Jack Scott, chancellor of California's community college system, asks Santa Monica College to delay its plan to institute a two-tiered tuition system, saying the legality of the program is still in question; Santa Monica has proposed premium pricing for popular classes. MORE

Mar. 30, 2012

Santa Monica College in California will offer some courses for a higher price, so that students who are eager to get into a particular class can do so if they pay more; if the college succeeds in implementing the two-tiered tuition plan, many other community colleges are likely to follow; since 2009, enrollment in California community colleges has fallen by 300,000 students, to 2.6 million, and many believe the difficulty of registering for classes is the most important deterrent. MORE

Mar. 3, 2012

Editorial urges community colleges to end the practice of shunting capable students into non-credit remedial classes based on standardized test scores; notes studies showing that more than a quarter of students assigned to these classes could have passed college-level classes with a grade of B or better; concludes that community colleges must quickly develop better ways to get extra help to students who really need it, without sidetracking those who are ready to do the work. MORE

Feb. 29, 2012

Two studies by Teachers College of Columbia University find community colleges unnecessarily place tens of thousands of entering students in remedial classes; finds that more than a quarter of them could have passed college-level courses. MORE

Feb. 14, 2012

President Obama, as part of his 2013 fiscal year budget, proposes an $8 billion fund to train two million workers for well-paying jobs in high-demand industries; fund, which needs Congressional approval, will be used to bolster partnerships between community colleges and businesses to train workers in areas like health care, transportation and advanced manufacturing. MORE

Jul. 17, 2011

Community colleges are routinely failing to provide enough athletic opportunities to women, as required under Title IX. (Series: Gender Games) MORE

{"type":"article","show_header_text":false,"header":"ARTICLES ABOUT COMMUNITY COLLEGES","query":"(des=\"Community Colleges\" or (des=\"Colleges and Universities\" and hdl=\"Community Colleges\") or hdl=\"A Boon to 2-Year Colleges, Affirming Their Value\") and tom!=\"Caption\" and tom!=\"Correction\" and tom!=\"List\" and tom!=\"Paid Death Notice\" and dsk!=\"Society\"","search_query":"(subject:\"Community Colleges\" OR (subject:\"Colleges and Universities\" AND headline:\"Community Colleges\") OR headline:\"A Boon to 2-Year Colleges, Affirming Their Value\") AND -type_of_material:\"Caption\" AND -type_of_material:\"Correction\" AND -type_of_material:\"List\" AND -type_of_material:\"Paid Death Notice\" AND -news_desk:\"Society\"","num_search_articles":"15","show_summary":true,"show_byline":true,"show_pub_date":true,"hide_thumbnails":false,"show_kicker":false,"show_title":false,"show_related_topics":true,"show_rad_links":true,"show_subtopics":true,"exclude_topics":"COLLEGES AND UNIVERSITIES;COMMUNITY COLLEGES","more_on_header":"MORE ON COMMUNITY COLLEGES AND:","alternate_index_subidx":"","show_thumbnails":true}

February 18, 2015, Wednesday

You know what saddened me when I worked at the community college? Meeting students who sounded apologetic for being there. They had heard the message that community college was not real college, and they listened.